Real or No Real?

I am choosing to post about “Be Right Back” and how it relates to the theory of the uncanny valley.  In “Be Right Back” the artificially intelligent Ash, or Ash₂ has an uncanny resemblance to the original Ash, or Ash₁. Ash₂ was able to mimic a lot of the activities and behaviors of Ash₁; however, after a while, Martha was able to see the differences between the two Ashes.  She was used to Ash₁ giving her emotional feedback and fighting with her and loving her and Ash₂ was not able to mimic the emotional connections that Martha and Ash₁ had made throughout their relationship.  Ash₂ was able to have this uncanny resemblance to the original Ash because he had access to everything Ash₁ had that dealt with technology.  I do not think that there is enough personality, emotion, and soul in someone’s internet world to recreate a person.  The internet world can tell a lot about what a person does and a lot about what a person likes, but it is not enough to build a copy of someone and successfully call them “human.”  Humans are composed of much more than what is found on an Instagram, Twitter, or Facebook profile.  I will admit that if someone does a lot of posting on these kinds of sites that more than likely they are very much like the person that he or she is trying to convey in real life; however, it will never be able to compare to the “real thing.” 

                “Be Right Back” is a really good example of why the uncanny valley will never disappear.  Martha went through so much to recreate Ash.  She spoke to him on the phone, she gave Ash₂ access to everything related to the original Ash’s life, and went so far as to make him human, and she still found Ash₂ to be creepy in certain ways.  For example, while they were lying in bed, she told Ash₂ that it was creepy that he did not close his eyes when they were asleep.  He told Martha he did not need sleep, because he is not really human. In Martha’s defense, who wouldn’t want to bring the person they loved the most back into their lives by any means necessary? It is very normal to want that; however, humans cannot get past some of the nonhuman and eerie qualities about someone like Ash₂, because he was only appearing to be human and not actually human.